Caterpillars In October?

[sandyRoe]

I just saw one on the garden path. Unseasonal, or what?

[Milvus]

Most butterflies/moths overwinter as eggs, caterpillars or pupae. A few even hibernate as adult butterflies. Its probably off to find a place to pupate. Did you get a picture?

[Jennykenny]

My nasturtiums are absolutely covered in them. Yellowy-green with hairs. Hundreds of them. Should I be alarmed??

[Ric.ror]

They will probably all die in the frost and snow due next month

[janbee]

My nasturtiums are heaving with them. Big vile things they are too. (caterpillars that is not, the flowers)

[sandyRoe]

Milvus, I didn't get a picture. It was on the front garden path and I lifted it and dropped it into next doors shrubs.
It was a fawny/tan colour about an inch long and slightly over 1/8 of an inch wide.

[janbee]

Sandy, that was a cobra !

[sandyRoe]

It looked like this

http://butterfly-conservation.org/files/grayling-caterpillar_dave-green-web.jpg

[craft1948]

Yesterday the cleaner found a butterfly in my toaster...

[sandyRoe]

I think I read somewhere that some butterflies shelter for the winter. Seems a bit early for that unless the one in the toaster knows something that the rest of us don't, Craft48.

[Milvus]

SandyRoe the Grayling exists as a caterpillar from September through to May/June then pupates before turning into a butterfly between July - Sept.
Are you on the coast?

[Jennykenny]

I'm on the south coast in Worthing, so I can expect to see them all winter??

[Milvus]

Graylings will hibernate as a caterpillar over winter JennyK

[sandyRoe]

Milvus, I'm in Belfast. Throughout the summer I've noticed lots of those brown, spotted with white, butterflies that this caterpillar metamorphoses into.